Ron!

Florida's governor rages against the dying of the white

Ron DeSantis, a man currently at war with a cartoon mouse, is announcing his run for President of the United States today. Yesterday his wife, Casey, released a pre-launch video entitled “America is worth the fight… Every. Single. Time.” The video shows America’s favorite go-go boot model backstage at a fictitious campaign event. Behind him hangs an enormous American flag. A narrator says, “They call it faith because, in the darkness, you can see a brighter future. The faith that our best days lay ahead of us…” We see Ron striding through a curtain, looking at the floor to see if he’s hitting his mark correctly, buttoning his jacket, then trotting towards an unseen stage and an unseen crowd. Our man is ready to fight, darn it!

Once seen as a serious Trump rival for the Republican nomination, Ron DeSantis has lately been giving off huge Jeb! energy. Jeb Bush, of course, was another popular Florida governor who tried to take his act to the national stage. Like Ron, Jeb! had a big war chest and big dreams. He had the backing of the establishment and Republican Rasputins whispering in his ear. He had name recognition, a solid record, and binders full of policy. The problem, as Jeb! found out, was that nobody much cared about Jeb! His mighty ambitions turned to pudding. Presumably Ron DeSantis watched the Bush campaign, dipped three fingers in that pudding, tasted it, and said, “That will not be my fate.”

How to escape the fate of Jeb! must be top of mind of the DeSantis campaign. Rather than the elder Bush brother’s milquetoast politics and timid campaign appearances, they’ve gone BIG. BIG in the culture war! BIG in building the Super PAC! BIG with the shore-up-the-foreign-relation-credentials European media tour while Florida floods! BIG in all measures except policy, personality, and performance.

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The policy part of the equation is, of course, irrelevant. DeSantis’s only actual policy position since winning a second term has been owning the libs. The Don’t Say Gay thing, the book banning thing, transforming a progressive, artsy public college into Hillsdale on the Atlantic, going after health care for trans people, the six week abortion ban, the the Disney thing. None of it is about anything other than being as big an asshole as he can be. Why? For one reason: to get to the right of Trump on social issues because he knows that’s all his people care about. The GOP is now the Grievance Party, wanting only to rage, rage against the dying of the white.

DeSantis understands this.

But will it be enough? Can he out-Trump his neighbor in West Palm without alienating Trump voters? Early indications are no. While being an asshole might come naturally to him, the bullying posture and tone do not. There’s a reason that campaign video didn’t feature the Ron himself speaking; he’s a stiff. He seems inauthentic, like a kid who practices his tough guy act in the bathroom mirror.

Governor Go-Go Boots

DeSantis may have Trump’s cruelty, but he lacks Trump’s glee. The best bullies shove dirt in your face because they think it’s funny. DeSantis does it because he wants you to believe it’s good for you. That’s no fun. The Trump people want to whoop it up while the burn the country down. The DeSantis people want you to join in prayerful reverance over the flames. Where’s the fun in that? He’s like if you took Mike Pence’s sanctimonious bullshit, mixed it with Ted Cruz’s finger-pointing whine, swirled it together in a barrel of waste oil, and dumped it into a river. Yes, it will sicken the libs. But will it be good for you?

Returning to the pre-launch video, what is the “brighter future” that the DeSantis people envision? In Florida, school library shelves are empty, minorities are being warned to stay away, women are being denied healthcare. Big business is pulling out. Is that the America Ron DeSantis is fighting for?

By the way, I didn’t want to link to all off the offensive legislation that DeSantis has signed, but SB1580 is particularly egregious. The bill, according to the Human Rights Campaign, “will allow healthcare providers and insurers to deny a patient care on the basis of religious, moral, or ethical beliefs. It creates a license to discriminate by allowing healthcare employers to discriminate in hiring, and it bars medical Boards from disciplining doctors for spreading misinformation.”

In other words, a doctor doesn’t have to treat you if they don’t like you.

Some people might say that having the Human Rights Campaign on your ass is a bad thing. Not so in the world of the modern Republican Party. It is a badge of honor. Having the NAACP issue an actual travel warning to minorities against visiting your state? Well, that’s positively yummy. Just like pudding.

Pudding

I don’t know what’s going to happen with DeSantis’s campaign any more than anybody else does. All I know is, the guy sucks. Worse, he sucks on purpose. He sucks because he thinks sucking is the way to win. And, who knows? He might be right. Recent history has taught us that Republican voters reward shitheads because their shitheadedness gives them moral license to unleash their own “fuck your feelings” morality on their communities and neighbors. It’s a me, me, me politics that offers nothing but the sugar high of rage. It feels good for thirty minutes and then you’ve got to find another target at which to point your fury. Oh yeah, now they’re targeting Target.

I do have one suggestion for the DeSantis campaign. With HBO Max rebranding today as Max, perhaps Ron should take a page from their marketing playbook. After all, Ron DeSantis is kind of a mouthful. Maybe they should go for something shorter, pithier. I think they should go with “Ron!”

Anyway, fuck that guy.